Too much peace
by Mischief Mage
Summary: Set after the endless waltz. Peace is wreaking havoc on the gundam pilots and as an excuse for a get together, Quatre has organised a chess tournament for them. An insight to what each might have done once the war was over. Mild yaoi references. Sillyness
1. Antonym for boredom: chess

Throughout the Earth sphere and colonies, peace reigned, with an iron fist. The world was a recently baked cake with a smooth, shiny icing but a badly mixed base, lumps of flour and ants encased in sugar floating about, just waiting to be unearthed. Sensitivity had been turned up to full blast, jail sentences being handed out to Earth sphere teachers for telling the colony children that "Gundam" was spelt G-U-N-D-A-M not C-O-N-Q-U-E-R-E-R.

The clever retreated to their "middle of nowhere" getaways, biding their time until there had been a few minor scuffles and the world leaders had figured out a more realistic way to maintain peace. A black eye or blood nose was exactly what was needed to make people open their eyes.

Quatre looked up from his binoculars and sighed. He pulled over a book and began to flick through the pages absent-mindedly before sighing again. He shut the book with a snap in his right hand. He weighed it in his hand before throwing it across the room. It nicked a large porcelain vase on its way. It wobbled in a typical comedic fashion before tipping over and smashing on the floor, shards of colour spinning away into every corner of the room.

Quatre yawned. He was _bored_.

There was only so many times that you can re-read a book and only so many times that you can look at the view saying "Beautiful". He had eventually moved through all the descriptive words in the dictionary from "Delightful" to "ordinary" to "nauseating".

This had been going on for half a year now. He missed to contact with the other pilots. He had tried contacting them…

_**(Ring ring)**_

"_Hello?"_

"_Duo, it's me Quatre"_

"_Again? What's up?"_

"_Ummm…just wanting to see how you were doing…"_

"_I'm fine. I was fine when you called yesterday, the day before, the day before that, the day before that, the day before that, and the day before that day."_

"_But wait, I didn't call you the day before the day before the day before the day before the day before yesterday. I was sick that day. I called the day _before_ that day."_

"_Oh…really? Well, I was fine then too."_

"_Excellent"_

"…"

"…"

"…"

"…"

"_Quatre?"_

"_Yes?"_

"_What do you want?"_

_**(sound of phone hanging up)**_

"_Quatre? Quatre? Helloooo? Dammit"_

…

Quatre didn't even want to think about trying to ring Heero again …

_**(Phone rings)**_

"_Hello?"_

"_Heero! Hi, it's Quatre, how are you? It's been a long time!"_

"_Good bye""_

_**(Phone rings again)**_

"_What?"_

"_Hey, it's Quatre, how have you been?"_

_**(sound of phone hanging up)**_

_**(Phone rings again)**_

"_Quatre, bugger off"_

"_Bu-"_

_**(sounds of phone being yanked from the wall and stamped on many, MANY times)**_

…

Quatre shuddered.

He wandered over to his bed and let himself fall onto the sheets. Quatre's bed was normally so flat that they it was probably made with a level ruler, so Quatre didn't notice the tall pointy bump in the sheets…well…he didn't notice until he had fallen on it.

"OW"

The young man whimpered as he pulled the strange object out from under the duvet. It was a bishop from his old chess set. It must have landed in his bed when he had thrown the pieces across the room in frustration last night. He pulled his shoulder back and prepared to add the bishop to the pile of unloved items in the farthest corner of the room. He hesitated, he had an idea.

Duo had asked Quatre what he had wanted. Company. The bishop was from a chess game that needed two players.

Quatre rushed over to his chest of drawers and pulled out a leather-bound book, full of the numbers that the other pilots didn't know he had, and a mobile phone. His fingers flew across the numbers. The familiar dial tone sounded in his ear.

"Hello?"

"Hello Trowa? It's me, Quatre…don't worry about how I got this number. Are you free this week?"

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	2. Once was a Heero

** Mischief mage**: Sorry i forgot it in the first chapter. Also... all reviews are very welcome

**Disclaimer:** Anyway... i do not own any part of Gundam Wing. Not at all.

* * *

A helicopter touched down outside of Quatre's house. The clouds of sand settled to reveal a young man getting down from the chopper. Heero Yuy glanced up at the house, before shaking his head. He couldn't believe that he had actually agreed to come. But then again…perhaps it did make sense. Heero had felt empty after the war, he had tried taking up every sport known to man and he had even tried knitting. Knitting hadn't lasted very long, especially after he had been found holding the two needles like mobile suit controls, running around an empty room making aeroplane noises. Aside from that, agreeing to come had shut Quatre up. The other pilot had rung Heero from every place imaginable, even from the phone at ballet (Heero's most recent hobby which was NOT going well. Ever tried to re-enact shooting down Leo's in Wing Zero using expressive dance? Looked incredibly like the knitting needles incident except with tights and ballet shoes.)

When Heero thought about it, perhaps a small reunion might fill the void momentarily. He tightened his grip on the small black box he held, the contents rattled as he walked to the front door. His trained eyes caught sight of a small pile of shattered pottery below a bedroom window. Heero winced, he had an appreciation for clay goods, being forced to polish the Earth museum's collection of well preserved chamber pots had taught him that. Why the Earth museum even had a collection of well preserved chamber pots Heero had no idea. 19Th century AD bullying perhaps?

The front door was unlocked, Heero let himself in and wandered around until he became sick of running into Rashid's men and various dancing girls doing things that their master Quatre couldn't even imagine…but then again, Quatre didn't have much of an imagination for that sort of thing so it wasn't saying much…anyway…he became sick of running into people didn't look like they needed a room so much as a large hotel, so Heero ambled into the central lounge where Quatre, Trowa, Duo and Wufei already were. They all looked up as he entered, Duo tugging at his shortened braid irritably.

Heero had heard all about it. No matter who Duo was fighting for, his fan-base of fangirls had never wavered. Eventually, they had found his scrap business with Hilde. Hilde had been drugged and locked in a cupboard, giving the girls a chance to tug at every tuggable piece of Duo available, terror and high pitched screams immobilizing the pilot completely. During the struggle, one of the more desperate girls had cut an inch off of Duo's braid. Heero had been in deep space at the time (trash disposal)…but he heard the screams of maniacal rage all the same.

Due to Duo's contributions to the attaining of "peace", he had been left with only a fine and the wrench was eventually removed from the girl's left nostril.

Trowa and Wufei looked generally unchanged. Wufei's work in the Preventer agency had kept him occupied and happy. Trowa's work at the circus had also kept him content. However, a neatly packed lunch of peanut butter sandwiches (cut into triangles, crusts removed with smooth peanut butter), shiny red apple and nutritious muesli bar in a big red lunchbox showed that perhaps Catherine had finally made the transition from being sisterly to motherly. The gashes in Trowa's massive fringe showed where Catherine had tried to cut it confirmed this. Perhaps Trowa had been wise in persisting in using titanium based hair gel.

Quatre stood up, grinning from ear to ear.

"Heero, you've finally come." He began eagerly, "I suppose I might as well explain it to you all." Quatre looked to each of his companions. "I have called you all here with the hope of having a small chess competition while having to chance to catch up. I've organised the games, as we have an uneven number of people, one person will have to play two games before the final. Heero will play Duo first and I will play Wufei. The winner of the game between Wufei and I will play Trowa and the winner of that game will play the final against the winner of the game between Heero and Duo. Got it?"

There were four nods.

"Good. Oh and I have some extra sets of chess pieces if anyone…" Quatre trailed off as all the other pilots pulled out their own box of chess pieces. It was the same as with gundams. NEVER touch another person's chess pieces. That means NEVER.

"Oh ok then. Well…we'll have lunch first and then begin shall we? Duo and Heero's game first."

* * *

The five young men sat around a smallish table, eating and talking.

Heero sat beside Wufei and after twenty minutes of silence, he felt that perhaps he should say something…

"How is your work with the preventers?"

"Fine"

They were silent again. Heero listened as Quatre chatted animatedly to Trowa about how lonely he had been getting without people his age. Heero hadn't felt lonely at all over the time since the war. He had visited Relena often although these had ceased in the past month. Heero had never considered the consequences of Relena dressing in suits with her hair tied back. At least, not until he had swaggered down the street with a hangover, she had seen him and he had told her "Sorry but I don't swing that way." It was then that Heero discovered that there are ways to hide axes in business suits and that there are advantages to being able to run very, very fast.

At last, Quatre stood up and proposed that they return to the lounge where they could start the first game. Heero sighed and lay down his knife and fork. Next time he went to visit Relena he would bring Quatre and send him in first. Who could be cold enough to consider chopping such an engaging smile into little pieces with a woodcutter's axe?


	3. The much loved reaper man

Duo stood up glanced over at Heero, but his face showed nothing. Duo was sure enough of his playing ability but…he wouldn't put anything past Heero, Duo knew about all the classes Heero had been taking. He had laughed so hard when he had found Heero practising ballet positions that he had almost fallen in the scrap metal compressor.

Duo shook himself and followed the others into the lounge where the couches had been positioned to resemble grandstands around a small square polished table with two polished chairs at opposite ends. A polished chess board lay bare on the table, a timer beside it (also polished).

Heero took his seat. Duo did the same and pulled out his box of chess pieces. Heero began laying out his white, quite unremarkable pieces. Rook. Knight. Bishop. King. Queen…

Duo hesitated before setting out his pieces. They were black and just like normal pieces…except that they all had a mini scythe, little black wings, a wooden black steed of doom and two large fangs protruding from their mouths. They all had Duo's face imprinted on them from when it had first been given to him by his fan club. Duo remembered hacking at the box with a meat cleaver, fearing that it was another one of those cards that sang shrilly about the dirty things that whoever she was wanted to do to him. Miraculously, none of the pieces were damaged. Duo suspected that there was some metal involved due to the way all his fridge magnets stuck to them. Eventually, after some work, the chess pieces resembled something that he could be proud of.

"Still with the God of Death thing?" remarked Heero.

"Old habits die hard buddy"

"At least now I know what you would look like as a vampire."

Duo looked closely at the pawn in his hand, the fangs protruding from his mini face extended to below his knees. If he were a vampire, it looked as though he would be gouging holes in his thighs before doing anything else.

"Shall we begin?"

Heero had already finished setting out his pieces. Duo scrambled to set his up as well. Once he saw that he was ready, Heero moved one of his white pawns forward two spaces. As he lifted his piece, there was an intake of breath, and when he put it down, there were sighs of relief all around the room. Duo looked around to see Rashid's men sitting in a circle around them, their eyes following their every move, popcorn held halfway to their open mouths.

bing

The chime of the timer as Heero finished his turn. Duo reached for one of his black, demon pawns, grimacing as the crowd held their breath as he lifted it. He decided to try something, he let the piece down, the crowd sighed. He lifted it, they gasped. He let it down, they sighed. Up. Gasp. Down. Sigh. Up. Gasp. Down. Sigh. Up. Gasp. Down. Sigh. Up. Gasp. Down. Si-

"Stop playing with them."

"Yes mother"

Duo put his pawn down on the board and left it there.

Bing

Tick

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Heero stared fixedly at the pieces, thinking hard. Duo shifted in his seat…waiting.

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Tick

"Hurry up will ya?"

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bing

Duo immediately snatched up his knight and set it where he could take one of Heero's pawns in the next turn. That was how he played. Fast.

bing

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Duo's heart rate picked up. Heero was just staring fixedly at the board.

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"Just hurry up please!"

"I'll move when I'm ready. So shut up."

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"Heero!" Duo whined.

"I won't tell you again"

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Tick

Duo felt something building up in him, threatening to break loose. If there was one thing he was not…it was patient.

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_Just calm down Duo. Give him some time._

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_Grrrrrrrrrr_

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Ti-

"AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRGH!" Duo sprang out of his chair, knocking the pieces flying.

"THE GOD OF DEATH WAITS FOR NO MAN! DO YOU HEAR ME?" he yelled at the top of his lungs with pent up insanity not only from the game but also from all the years of quiet. He then turned and sprinted out the door knocking the crowd of men over like the pins in a bowling alley on the moon.

Trowa, Quatre and Wufei rushed out to the front door. Duo was running in a circle, hands in the air cackling and yelling "SO YOU THOUGHT YOU WERE RID OF THE GOD OF DEATH, DID YOU? HELL NO BABY! I AM BACK!" between insane cackles.

Quatre walked back inside to Heero.

"I think Duo has withdrawn…he was disqualified for knocking the board over anyway" Quatre said quietly.

Heero nodded.

"I suppose it was his turn for a bought of madness" Wufei said thoughtfully as he came in the door. "That's one period of insanity for nearly all of us. Whose turn is it next?"

* * *

**Mischief Mage:** heheh...sorry if i annoyed anyone with all those "..." and "tick"s  



	4. this be madness yet there is method in't

**Mischief mage:** Hey i found away around me breaking my computer. Using my parents computer. I decided to give this chapter a name, i will eventually get around to finding ones for the others...eventually.

* * *

Three shots of tranquiliser and one straight-jacket later, Duo was being relatively quiet, tied to a pillar in the corner of the main lounge. Wufei sat near by, staring at his tousle-haired fellow pilot. He was rubbing his wrist where three reddening teeth marks were, evidence of Duo's reluctance to being trussed up. It was saddening that this had been the only way to keep Duo from driving the dune hoppers over the roofs of the village, Wufei's regret for the situation shining out through his dark eyes…

_I knew I should have asked Quatre for a rabies vaccine_

"Wufei! Shall we get started?"

Wufei nodded and joined Quatre at the table that had been righted since Duo's explosion. Quatre had already set out his polished pieces. His very polished pieces. Wufei stared. The pieces had so many layers of polish on them that each one looked like it was wearing a miniature upside-down gold-fish bowl on its top. Wufei shook himself and quickly set out his own chess pieces. Once done he nodded to Quatre who, with white pieces, would start first. Quatre did nothing.

"What's wrong?"

"Wufei…I you're missing some pieces…"

Wufei glanced down and counted.

"No I'm not."

"Count them!"

"Alright…1…2…3…4…5…6…yep that's all of them"

"You're meant to have sixteen pieces, you're missing 8 pawns, a knight and a queen"

Wufei sighed, trying to be patient, he explained.

"Quatre, Chess is a game that has strong parallels to a war right?"

"Right."

"Well, as the commander of my side, I refuse feed the fires of war with beam-cannon fodder such pawns, and I refuse to include women in my fighting force."

Wufei nodded, eyes shut, as if that settled the matter.

there was a brief pause before his opponent burst out.

"But Wufei, the queen is one of the most powerful pieces in the game!"

"Are queens still women?"

"Yes, bu-"

"Then I refuse to include one in my side."

Quatre face was difficult to describe as his need to play a proper game of chess clashed with the need to be an accomodating host. It looked as though the two opposing halves of his brain were playing a heated game of paper, scissors, rock behind those wide, wide eyes.

Finally...

"…… fine. But then why are you missing a knight?"

"Same reason"

The dumb-struck silence that followed was broken only by Duo's low growls as he gnawed at the rope that held him to the thick pillar.

Quatre had to say something.

"Wufei…knights are generally men"

"Quatre, quatre, quatre" the chinese pilot said, shaking his head in a mildly amused way, " if you looked closely at the other knight I had you would understand. No man could sit on a horse like that without crushing the contents of his pants into a fleshy paste."

Quatre and the other three pilots winced, their hands reaching instinctively for their groins.

The young man finally gave in.

"Fine" he said sadly as he began taking his pawns, his queen and one knight and putting them back into their velvet lined box.

Wufei nodded in a satisfied way. So far, Wufei's personality had successfully remained unchanged after sessions with five therapists. Despite Sally's pleadings, he had refuse to change his attitude and was ignoring the way that his inability to see women as equals was mutating into an inability to physically see women at all at particular times in the day . It had been particularly easy to avoid listening to the third therapist who had been a woman herself. His "little problem" had kicked in half-way through a session and all that Wufei had been able to see was a floating notepad and pencil in an empty chair that made odd whiny noises. The woman had become extremely nervous and by the end of the two hours had burst into tears, spilling her guts to Wufei about how she had always wanted to be a dog breeder and about her troubled childhood, telling Sally afterwards that she couldn't continue with Wufei because of the way he seemed to "see straight through her".

Wufei grinned to himself. His current therapist was well on his way to cracking. Wufei had been surprised that the balding man had agreed to meet with him again after he had set the couch and mounted moose head in the therapist's office on fire after dousing the room in turpentine. It probably had something to do with Sally spending three thirds of the Preventers' funding on it. Next time he would make sure that the man's toothbrush moustache caught alight too.

**Bing**

Wufei was distracted from his thoughts of therapist harassment by Quatre finishing his first turn. Quatre looked extremely disoriented with only six pieces, he had moved his one knight in front of his king, more out of desperation then anything. Wufei smirked, this was going to be easy.

Quatre was not used to playing without a wall of pawns to protect his king so his following moves were made in hope of protecting his king from an early disembowelment

Wufei on the other hand simply moved his own pieces into position to knock off each of Quatre's pieces, one by one.

Eventually…

**Bing**

**WHAM **

Wufei had brought his rook down on Quatre's bishop, hard. The blob-topped piece skittered off the board.

"AH!"

Quatre cried out has he dove to catch the piece as it sped off the table.

Tenderly, he deposited the bishop in the velvet box, pulling out a small square of fabric and a teddy bear the size of the remains of the therapist's couch after Wufei had finished with it. Wufei's jaw dropped slightly as Quatre laid the teddy bear beside the fallen bishop and tenderly tucked it into his bishop-shaped hole with the fabric. With a great deal of dignity, Quatre returned to the board and quickly made his move.

**bing**

**WHAM**

The same thing happened with Quatre's knight, his two castles, his one knight and his remaining bishop fell to the power of the descending black pieces until finally…

"Check mate"

**WHAM **

there was a sickly "snap" noise.

"NO!"

The top of the white king was snapped off by the force by which Wufei had brought his knight (it was a male one I assure you) down.

Wufei watched smugly as Quatre left the table and half walked-half sprinted out the door cradling the pieces of wood in his arms, sniffling all the way. Wufei knew that Quatre was no weakling…he was just…sensitive.

Wufei pulled a small notepad and pencil from his pocket as Trowa left in search for Quatre. He had successfully upset a comrade; that had to be worth an extra two sessions with the doctor, giving him a total of three. That would leave him with time to shred up the shelf of psychology books, write vulgar phrases across the wall with a welding torch, draw moustaches and devil horns on all the portraits, throw that porcelain vase out the window, foul up the fish bowl, shave the dog, drug the secretary and the parrot, unravel the tapestry, clog up the doc's mail box with spam, draw pictures on the new couch with red nail polish, pour paint stripper on every car in the parking lot, fill the water dispenser with vodka, dye the room purple and set fire to everything that had escaped his previous attention. That would keep him amused for at least another month with preventer work filling in his spare time.

Peace time had been good to him. Oh yes it had.


	5. Do not meddle in the affairs of clowns

**Mischief Mage:** Yay my precious computer and the half finished chapter on it has finally been returned to me! The second to last match. Hurrah!

* * *

Trowa Barton found Quatre in his room, curled up in a fetal position in the corner, sobbing slightly over the lumps of wood and polish in his cupped hands. After a few minutes of consoling him with sympathetic words, Trowa was able to get Quatre upright so that Trowa could then prod him in the right direction with the bow of the violin that had been lying on the bed. Trowa would willingly have put a comforting hand on his friend's shoulder but with Duo around, you could never be too careful. His fangirls seemed to follow him everywhere and they seemed to enjoy … embellishing the relationships of the other pilots immensely. Catherine had blocked Quatre's number after she had stumbled across a number of graphic 3x4 websites that Trowa had been unaware of. In the following argument Trowa had asked who it was that he was apparently having beautiful sex with, his argument being that if he was having an NC-17 rated relationship as a minor with a minor, that he, of all people, had the right to know who it was. Catherine had put her throwing knives to work that night. Trowa could now wear 3 pretty, pretty earrings from each ear. 

Trowa gave Quatre a soft tap on the head with the bow, indicating that he was to sit down. Trowa glanced sideways as a low growl told him exactly how Duo felt about having his "corner of crazy" invaded. Trowa prodded Quatre once more and the blonde boy shuffled about a foot away from the farthest reach of Duo's teeth.

Once Quatre had been dealt with, Trowa sat down opposite to Wufei who had returned all his pieces to their places and was now sitting, arms folded, looking very smug indeed.

Trowa set out his pieces, all sixteen of them. Wufei raised an eyebrow at him.

"I'm afraid that I'm not as accommodating as Quatre is"

Wufei shrugged

"Fine."

"Aaaand before we begin, I would like to introduce some people to you."

Wufei's eyebrow arched higher than before.

Trowa gestured to his chess pieces.

"The two rooks are Georgiana and Ignatius; the knights, Sir Rasputin and Dame Glorifillia; the Bishops, Sister Morgana and Brother Cornelius; Queen Catherine and King Lucifer; and the pawns, Corporal Arabella, Francesca, Narcissa, Alexandria, Fitzwilliam, Sylvester and Leviticus."

Wufei's eyebrow was in danger of disappearing into his hair, which is a big deal considering how tightly he was wearing it back.

"You named all of you're pieces?"

"I did"

"Well then, what's that pawn's name there?" Wufei asked pointing accusingly to a battered looking piece at the very end of the line.

"That's Bernard" Trowa told him while scowling at the pawn.

"You mean like that mime guy that joined the circus and went out with Catherine for a while?"

Trowa nodded shortly.

Wufei went on.

"Queen Catherine? Is there any kind of blatant symbolism going on here?"

Trowa paused for a minute before saying "No", not meeting his opponent's eye.

Silently, Trowa gracefully picked up a pawn (Sylvester) and placed it down two squares along the board.

Wufei was still confused by Trowa's behaviour.

"Was there _any_ point in name all of your chess pieces?"

The ghost of a grin flashed across Trowa's lips.

"Yes" he said simply.

Wufei glanced down at the chess board and gasped. Trowa could see the shapes of Georgiana, Morgana, Arabella, Francesca and the other female pieces fade from the reflection in Wufei's eyes. Half of Trowa's pieces were invisible to him now.

Wufei glared at Trowa

"That was a cheap trick. How did you know about my condition anyway?"

Trowa smiled slightly to himself.

"It doesn't matter _how _I knew. What matters is-" he said whilst reaching for the timer.

Bing

"-now that my first turn in complete. We can't go back"

Wufei looked as dangerous as a bomb being deactivated by a blind folded Edward Scissorhands at a 21st party.

Trowa smirked as smoke began pouring out his opponent's nostrils. Wufei didn't know, but Trowa had actually been seeing the same therapist as him (at least until Wufei vaporized the building). Catherine had sent Trowa there after he had tried to assassinate Bernard the Mime. But it wasn't _his_ fault, all brothers get a bit…_protective_ don't they? He had just wandered into the circus like he owned the place and then Catherine had just begun…_swooning_ whenever he passed.

Besides, the first incident hadn't come anywhere near killing the guy. Trowa had simply mixed high concentration weed killer into the black and white face paint. As a result, the mime had run back and forth backstage, clutching his face and screaming like a little girl. Trowa had resisted the urge to ask Catherine "Guess: what's black, white and red all over?"

And from there on began something of a war between clown and mime. Bernard let the teething lion's into Trowa's caravan while he was changing. Trowa signed Bernard's up for training for the "human cannonball act". Bernard put a scorpion in Trowa's performing pants. Trowa told Catherine that he had seen Bernard hitting on the magic show assistants, the useless flirts that they were and Bernard told Catherine that Trowa had been ringing Quatre using the ringmaster's personal phone. Trowa poured glue on the underside of Bernard's shoes before the start of a show. Then, in an act of the utmost wickedness, Bernard mixed purple hair dye in with Trowa's hair gel. At breaking point, Trowa replaced Bernard's pre-"Bernard the amazing fire-eating mime act"-drink with kerosene. He was sure that the audience had never seen anything like _that_ before. As one would guess, Bernard was no longer dating Catherine and a smug Trowa was given a 3:30 booking at the therapist's practice in town.

Bing

Wufei had grudgingly finished his turn.

Trowa could only smile as he led Wufei's seven pieces to one side of the board, quite happily using Bernard the Pawn as bait while the girls went up through the gap to encircle Wufei's troops.

Wufei could probably guess what was happening, but honestly, how can you fight a lump of wood that you can't see?

At length, Wufei drew near enough to Bernard to take the pathetic little pawn. Using his bishop he crashed down with all his frustration onto the chewed looking chunk of wood. All that was left of Bernard was a pile of cream coloured sawdust. Trowa pulled out a dainty tassle duster and gently swept the powdered Bernard off of the board. Something similar had been done for the real Bernard too.

"You really don't care that I just disintegrated your pawn do you?" Wufei asked, his eyes flicking sideways to Quatre who as watching from the floor and looking scandalized.

"No, not really"

No one checks out Trowa's sister. The last time Duo had ever made a comment on Catherine looking pretty in the circus ring, Trowa had shot him between the eyes with a paintball gun from point blank range.

Trowa moved a knight into place, or rather, he fiddled with the air over the chess board.

"Checkmate"

"What?"

"There's no where for your king to go."

"Prove it."

"Fine. You know what? I lied about the girl's names. Their names are actually Francis, George, Morgan, Aaron, Cat, Narciss_us_, Phill and Alexander."

And lo and behold, the eight pieces magically appeared before Wufei's eyes with every move of the King being into the way of one of the white pieces.

sflump

Trowa glanced across to see that Wufei had crumpled and rolled off of his seat, eyes wide open and staring, every few second he would twitch.

"What's wrong with him?" Heero asked as he rose from the gradually vacating couch.

'I think he's got hypo-confidence-ia. It's a bit like hypothermia except it happens when his pride or masculinity is severely affronted. Wait here; I know where Quatre keeps the medicine'

And so Trowa dashed off down the corridor to the medicine cabinet…or rather the medicine closet…one could call it a medical pantry really.

Trowa stuck his fringed head into the store room. Quatre had really prepared for every eventuality. The medicines were ordered according to the pilot that would most likely need them. The part-time clown couldn't help but scan the shelves.

The 'Heero Yuy' shelf wasn't really a shelf at all. The name was simply stuck to the wall above a large bubble-wrap suit to prevent him from injuring himself or anyone else if need be. It was bullet proof, knife proof, anti-bacterial, covered his mouth to prevent poison being taken, was strong enough to hold off a plummeting fridge and came in a range of colours.

'Duo Maxwell' had a whole wall to himself. There were strait-jackets that could be layered onto each other, muzzles, chains, and sedatives in every possible form; in darts, syringes, powder and bullets with instructions on dosage and usage for each state of the drug.

The slightly-taller-than-the-other-pilots pilot could not help but frown as he glanced over his small shelf. The only thing there was several DVD's. One was labelled, Trowa's life age Jan 195- Feb 196. There was enough for a small series. He assumed that it was just in case he got amnesia again. His friends seemed to be getting a bit paranoid. Twice in a lifetime. Give it a break.

Quatre's shelf consisted of various jars of designer drugs, happy pills and flinstone's jelly vitamins.

Finally, Trowa reached Wufei's shelf. He found the label 'for low confidence levels. Must enter the blood stream.' Grabbing a syringe of the pale fluid, Trowa dashed back to the chess room, deciding to read the rest of the label after he had dealt with the unconscious pilot.

'I've got it' He said briskly before ramming the syringe into Wufei's thigh.

Once the fluid had left the plastic tube, Trowa slowly removed the syringe and turned to the instructions written in Quatre's hand, reading it aloud.

'Maximum of one syringe a day. Once dosage has been taken, put Wufei in his room with a phone book, a telephone and the box of magazines and videos from the village which is under the stairs. Lock the door from the outside and do not disturb under any circumstances. There should be signs of life within a few hours.'

Heero and Trowa looked at each other in puzzlement before carrying out the advised steps.

Once downstairs again, the pair glanced to Quatre, who was still sitting in the corner just out of reach of Duo's jaws.

'Quatre…' Heero said slowly, 'What was in that?'

Blushing slightly, Quatre tried to maintain an air of dignity as he spoke. 'You won't believe this but I'm sure it works, you have to tru-'

'What was it?'

'Liquid Viagra' Quatre said meekly.

There was a brief silence in which even Duo ceased his growling, jaw dropped.

The tone and the atmosphere was captured effectively and succinctly by the next two words uttered.

'Uh oh'


	6. Death's fleeting brother: Sleep

**Mischief mage:** Just a kinda short intermission. One more chapter to go. Enjoy. Please review.

* * *

Duo tossed and turned, trying to get comfortable. Quatre had recommended that everyone have dinner and sleep, the competition would continue the next morning. Dinner had been eaten silence and afterwards, the pilots retired to their assigned rooms. The braided pilot groaned, trying to rub the small of his back which was slowly killing him. It wasn't that the bed that Quatre had gotten him was no good. It was a new king sized four-poster with goose down pillows and duvet and scarlet velvet hangings. The room included a window over looking the desert and a squashy couch which looked just as comfortable to sleep on. The only problem was that he was still tied to the pillar in the chess room.

* * *

Upstairs in his own room, Quatre squeezed his pillow tighter over his ears. Why oh why had he put his room beside Wufei's? Why? Actually…Why the hell had he asked the family planning doctor how to fix low confidence levels? Ear plugs and his thick pillow still weren't enough to block out the moaning and groaning of bed springs coming from the next room. Quatre lay eyes wide open the whole night, strange and horrifying images inspired by the sounds next door swimming tantalizingly across his vision.

* * *

Next door, the bed's springs rhythmically creaked indignantly. Nothing in the job description had prepared it for this. But Wufei ignored the peals of reproach as he continued. He had woken up in the room without his clothes, the door locked, an odd feeling that centred around the lower part of his torso, enough adult material to keep all of the world's troops happy for the next three decades and a helpful telephone. He had done what seemed right and came naturally at the time. He was still going at it. He had since learnt that DVD's and video tapes made a satisfying crack when layered on top of telephones and the new bed helped him gain altitude when it came to stomping on things. During his break from CD desiccation, he had greatly alleviated his feelings of worthlessness by making little men out of the magazines and posters he had found in the large cardboard box and then crushing them beneath his bare feet.

* * *

Trowa sat silently on the sill of the open window, watching the serene mini desert tornado's twist themselves out of existence. War and life as a mercenary had cemented his face into a poker-face mould. It would be difficult to change his expression without physically breaking his face into bits and gluing it back together in the desired shape. On the surface, he was absolute zero cold; one could swear that they could see small ice crystals forming at the end of his fringe, no apprehension of the upcoming match showing through as he devised complex yet brilliant strategies. On the inside, his resolve could be most succinctly described as a bowl of jelly on a park bench nailed to a ship sent see if there really is a God living inside the sun as ancient lore said; he was beyond wobbling.

* * *

Cracks echoed through the spacious room. Heero was putting the shooting gallery that he had requested to good use. His very being seemed to centre around the rifle that he held in his hands. His cobalt eyes narrowed behind his streamlined goggles. With one fluid motion, he would pull the trigger and jerk backwards as the gun recoiled from the impatient bullet. Within seconds, the gun would be reloaded and set back in place. Literally hundreds of shells littered the ground, he had known that learning to make his own ammunition at the Christmas break programme would be helpful. Despite the number of shots fired, only about three holes could be seen in the distant picture that he had stuck over the blank black silhouette at the end of the room. At last, Heero seemed content. He sat the end of the rifle on the ground and leant slightly on it. His eyes still never left the target, not even to blink. Needless to say, his eyeballs were getting quite dusty. The shape of words formed on his lips. 

'I'm going to kill you-', he hissed at the enlarged picture of a white chess king.

-'Lucifer'

* * *

splash 

The sun had crept over the horizon like a jogger after a summer holiday of beach bumming. The dinner table was now laid out with breakfast foods. None of the pilots had gotten any sleep. Wufei of course was still locked in his room. At this moment in time he was flinging the VCR at the window, trying to find away out. Quatre had just fallen asleep in his cornflakes, small bubbles breaking the milky surface, forcing droplets out of the bowl onto the table. Heero was having pancakes and had been enjoying them immensely until he had found the shape of a king chess piece in his maple syrup and had begun hacking at his hot cakes, flecks of brown turning the white walls into an abstract work of art. Trowa had painted out a chess board on his toast with the marmite if you don't know what it is…look it up. What d'ya think the internet's for? and prodding at the black and toast white squares with his butter knife, muttering under his breath. He glanced down as he felt something dripping on his pants. Milk. It was only then that he and Heero noticed that Quatre was drowning in six centimetres of milk and bran cornflake. The pulled him out and cleaned him up before looking to Duo who was face down in his eggs and bacon.

'Do you think he's dying too?' Trowa asked

'Don't think so. How can you drown in egg?'

Trowa shrugged. 'It's possible'

They were both right. It is possible to drown in an egg, it's just quite difficult. But Duo wasn't drowning in his breakfast, the others had still forgotten, or perhaps had decided not to untie him. So he had been forced to lengthen the rope that was holding him to the pillar so that he could eat. Eating eggs and bacon without utensils had been quite amusing until he had gotten yolk up his nose.

The two pilots who weren't supposedly satisfying the needs of the sealed section of a soldier's mind or hadn't just been face down in their breakfast glanced across the table where Quatre had regained consciousness, coughing half digested flake onto the table.

'Shall we get started then?' Trowa asked Quatre gently as the blonde he brushed himself down, making a retching sound as he smelt the patch of milk on his vest.

'What? Oh, that. Yes, lets get going. We'll have to start without Wufei.'

As the four pilots walked, or in Duo's case, crawled into the other room, the noise of a video player coupled with a television breaking through thick glass and the sight of a cloud of sand forming on the horizon of the desert went unheeded. Well, Quatre would have heard it and Duo would have seen it if they each hadn't still had food products in their ears and eyes.


	7. 195 Deja vu

**Mischief Mage:** Last chapter. yay! Now i don't have anything to distract me from my school work...

* * *

Heero sat down on the polished wooden chair, reaching down to his feet as he did so, hands groping for his box of chess pieces. His hands probed emptiness. 

'Heero' Quatre's voice said, 'I only just figured out that both you and Trowa own white chess pieces. I flipped a coin and Trowa won the right to go first. So I put a bit of soot on your pieces to tell them apart… What is that look for? Oh, don't worry, the soot comes off with a wet cloth, I'll do it myself afterwards. So is that okay? No? Well…umm…. we'll just have to get on with the game. Heero, stop looking at me like that…I mean it. Heero, please……please…PLEASE PUT THAT DOWN NOW! DON'T COME ANY CLOS-AAAAH!'

It took five minutes of Trowa and Duo's joint effort to stop Heero from stamping Quatre to the floor with the upended chess table.

Heero sat down on his chair haughtily as Trowa set up the table again. Quatre was still wheezing, clutching his bruised front and glancing at Heero with terrified eyes. Within a few minutes the white and … grey pieces were set. Trowa glanced out the window.

'Looks like a sand storm's coming up'

'Stop stalling'

Trowa dragged his eyes back to the board and left them there. For three minutes. Finally a kindly '_bing'_ was heard.

As Heero made his move, Trowa's mind wandered, or rather, skipped off track. No matter how fun this trip had been, he desperately needed to get back to the circus. Although he had made a deal with Catherine that if he stopped barbarically assassinating her boyfriends then she would let him see Quatre again, she never said that he couldn't sneak anaphrodisiacs into their dinner…

_bing_

Once they had returned to the chess game, Trowa's thoughts read like a graduate thesis on the production of zippers

'_I could give up my knight/Rasputin and use my bishop to initiate a pin formation…but then I would be leaving a side road to my king/Lucifer guarded only by a pawn/Felix/Bernard's replacement. Besides, he would expect a ploy like that…hmmm…what's that? Ha hah. Heero's trying to use that screw formation on me I shall avoid it. What ho? He's also got that group of pieces to the side, poised to make an attack. Surely I can not escape both. I must guess to see whether both of the formations were intentional on his part. The screw formation! How he is staring at it. Hey, this is the writer, if you read this, then I admire your diligence…or maybe your boredom. Hey…anyway, you might have just accidentally glanced here. In that case, you had better read the rest because….there could be other surprises eh? You don't believe me do you?…oh well…you can't blame a writer for trying. Anyway… He must be concentrating on how to use it! But wait, he could be staring at it without knowing in trying to avoid staring at the other one. But then he could be staring at it in the hope that I would be thinking that he's looking at that one to avoid looking at the other one so that he is actually meaning to use the one that he is focusing on…but that would mean that he knows that the other formation is there! In that case he must know that he could use either one. So which one to foil? They are both of equal danger to me. So what pieces would I lose if I set off the screw…hmmm…my rook/George/Georgiana? That's in a good position to unleash my ultimate attack! But for the other one…I would only lose my other bishop/Cornelius. I haven't used that one much so far…I could do without it. That settles it; I will foil the screw formation and sacrifice my knight/Glorifilia/Phill to the other formation. Here it goes_.'

And to end the seemingly endless deliberation that had gone on in his fringed head, Trowa moved his pawn, one pace forwards.

'_CRAP!' ,_thought Heero, '_he saw through my formation! Now what am I going to do, he must have seen that if I used the pin then I would leave my bishop in the open and subsequently my King. He's crafty. What if I tried to hide my knight in the section of the board that's covered by his fringe…that's half the board…no…he'd see through that…and then he might take it personally…wait a minute! Why do I care? Oh that's right…because if I do, then he'll show the video of me in the Swan lake matinee to Duo. Just as well I dropped it. The ice skating rink is on the other side of town to the ballet school. I can't wait to get back to it after this is over. But I don't miss that dick-head, Colin the Constipated cess-pit. If he tells me one more time that my translation of the destruction of Marimeia's base into figure skating looks like I have a cardboard tube stuck up my….I'm going to put high concentration acid on the blades of my skates and whack him over the head with a chair…Now…where to move…luckily that move of his foiled one of the formations he was planning…etc. etc. etc. etc.'_

Quatre could only stare with glazed eyes as these two strategic super powers prodded lumps of wood across the checked board. Being the youngest and the only brother of thirty children with twenty nine sisters at various stages of life…a large number going through puberty at the same time, he had developed a consoling face and ear drums of steel necessary to avoid getting a bloodied nose.

It was a trial when his sisters found their boyfriends cheating on them with other sisters. There had been a rather messy affair when one man had eventually gone out with every one of Quatre's sisters, cheating on them all at the same time and, every now and again, making passes at Quatre himself. The household drama had finally reached a climax when Iria had found the wretched man in the bedroom with _five_ of her sisters. It seemed as though he had seen the Winner family as a chance for some large group activities. To the horror of his sisters, during his period of insanity after the death of his father, Quatre documented the story, had it published under the name of 'The twenty nine daughters of Winner', distributed the books to bookstores through space and raked in the profits. That was the reason why he had avoided going back home to his colony. He was getting sick of finding graters between his bed sheets.

_Bing_

Quatre glanced up to see Heero prod a rook into a distant empty space before hanging his head in despair.

Meanwhile, Duo's recently regained cognitive functions were being pummelled beneath a new landslide of boredom. He returned to gnawing on his binds.

It wasn't until the distant cloud of sand had almost reached the gate of Quatre's house that the game became vaguely interesting.

Trowa had the advantage with nearly all his pieces forming a solid wall of wood between Heero's king, bishop and few remaining pawns. Trowa would have been smiling smugly if Heero hadn't already been doing it.

'What are you so happy about?' he ventured.

Heero pushed his bishop in position to pass through a gap in the wall which Trowa had missed in his next turn.

'Check.' His whisper rang through the room.

_Bing_

Trowa simply closed the gap.

_Bing_

Heero, moved his bishop back to his half of the board, still with the smug grin on his face.

'Check' He said again.

_Bing_

Trowa stared at his opponent's face. _HOW?_

_Bing_

The attention of the room was drawn to a sudden whirring that was coming from the board. All except Heero stared at the smudged bishop in surprise.

_Whirrrrrrrrrrrrrr-click! _Its top clicked open on a hinge

_Shloooooooop-Click_

_Shlooooooooop-Click_

_Shloooooooooop-Click_

_Shlooooooooooop-Click_

Duo sat with his bindings in his mouth, eyes wide.

_Shloooooooooooooop-click_

_Shloooooooooooooop-click_

_Shloooooooooooooop-click_

If Quatre's eyes bulged any larger, he would have needed to pick them up off the floor.

_Click…_

…

_whrrrrrrrrrmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm_

Trowa's dinner plate eyes reflected the machine that was charging itself before him. A beam cannon akin to that of Wing Zero's in design and size had sprouted up out of the top of the bishop on a telescopic metal rod like a huge metal tree. The tell-tale flickers of yellow light began to circle around the mouth of the cannon, getting brighter and brighter as the seconds passed. Finally, it was ready.

Trowa gulped.

_Uh oh_

* * *

A pair of blue eyes peered cautiously up over the upturned couch, surveying the damage as the non-disintegrated half of the chess table creaked as it fell over, scattering Heero's remaining pieces across the floor. 

Trowa opened is eyes, the eye that was now covered in soot looked like a white marshmallow on a crow's back, meanwhile the other eye, which was not covered in soot was surrounded by the soot-less shape of Trowa's hair which had protected half of his face from needing the services a rough dish cloth. He took a few deep breaths, finding that his chair was now hanging precariously over a minor crater in the floor. He glanced to Heero who was taking it as though 8cm chess pieces vaporised other chess pieces outside his front gate every morning…but then again, that was where he had gotten his idea from…he lived in a _weird_ town.

Heero smirked as he said,

'Check ma-'

'HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!'

The explosion caused by the beam cannon had assisted Duo in breaking out of his bindings, which allowed him to spring from ground, cackling maniacally, fling the doors open and leap outside…into the sand storm.

There was a brief moment of silence in the room.

'Perhaps we should go get him?' Quatre asked tentatively.

'Nah, it's just sand, he'll be alright' Heero answered calmly.

'Well I guess that's it, you won the competition Heero' Trowa said graciously.

Heero shrugged, 'you didn't do too bad yourself-'

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

'I thought you said he would be alright!' Quatre cried, having jumped a metre in the air.

'So I overestimated him!' Heero muttered. But then he paled as he thought, he jumped to his feet and ran outside to aid his friend.

'What's his problem?' Quatre asked, turning to Trowa.

'Let's go see'

So the two pilots followed the first two out to the front door.

Heero's mind was racing. _That's not an ordinary sandstorm, it's …_

He screeched to a halt at the front door, hearing two pairs of shoes protest as they came to a halt behind him.

Trowa and Quatre stared.

Fangirls.

Thousands of them.

Kicking up dust.

'Look! There he is!'

They all looked to see Duo drowning beneath the waves of groping hands and paralysing screams of… of… _adoration_.

_Well this sucks, _thought Duo, having given up all resistance after threats to distribute his braid to cloning laboratories across the galaxy.

_I worked so hard to get here without them knowing. Hell, I had sixteen different aliases, flew to three different colonies and sixty three countries to throw them off, pretended to get assassinated four times and pretended to get a sex change twelve times. How did they find me dammit?_

Heero felt a sudden pang of guilt, but he pushed it away; Duo's jokes about his ballet had_ stung_.

'HEERO, LOOK OUT!'

The pilot looked up to see a rabid fan girl who had just spotted him lunging. He stood like a possum in the headlights gaping, preparing for the approaching hugs and squeals.

But she never made it to him. Only a few inches away from him, she fell to the ground; knocked out…by a DVD case which I will not describe otherwise I will be thrown out for not having the appropriate rating for this story.

The three heads turned to see Wufei standing to the side, clothed, and smirking.

'Wufei! Your alright!' Quatre cried joyfully.

'Yeah. Thanks for setting me up last night. I haven't had that much fun for a while.'

Quatre, Heero and Trowa averted their eyes for a moment, as though blinded by Wufei's shining...adultness

But Quatre, as always, the accommodating and engaging host, asked, 'Which DVDs did you watch?'

'Oh, I didn't watch any.'

'Oh..ok…what about the magazines and the posters?'

'Didn't pay much attention to them. They make good paper men though'

'? What about the hooker?'

'What's a hooker? I didn't hire a fisherman if you must know. I didn't use the phone at all.'

'Do you have _any_ idea what the medicine a gave you was?'

'No.'

'Oh…ok...nevermind then'

Quatre sighed. Although it was something of a relief that Wufei wasn't accustomed with the ways in the world that they had been planning on him becoming accustomed with, it was still sufficiently awkward.

'HEEEEELLLLLLLLLOOOOOOOOO? I am DROWNING here if it has escaped your notice!'

'Hey, that reminds me, Wufei, how come you could see that fangirl, you couldn't see anything remotely female yesterday. You walked into that sculpture in the hallway three times! And that was a man for goodness' sake!'

'I think that something clicked last night. Being surrounded by women in such a form all night, I think that I subconsciously decided to acknowledge their existence.'

'hmmmm…fascinating'

'ARE YOU EVEN _LISTENING_ TO ME?'

'Alright, alright, we heard you. We're coming to get you in a minute!'

Quatre waved cheerily at Duo before turning to the others.

'He's screwed. What can we possibly do to help him? We can't hurt these innocent…though insane…girls. They know that we can't, that's how they operate, they immobilise us. We're helpless.'

'What _are_ you talking about?' Wufei asked hotly, 'we don't have to hold back!'

'But we could kill them, or hurt them!

'So?'

'Do you know how much trouble we would be in? Our credit for helping in the war is running short.' Quatre replied, exasperated, 'Heero's in particular' he added glancing at the pilot.

'You're weak, and dumb as well. We're safe! You're rich, you're untouchable, political immunity has been yours since you were born! Duo is innocent, Trowa and I are both seeing therapists and they probably don't have the sanest reports about us, they can't imprison us because we can plead instability of mind and pretend to have rabies if they try to arrest us! And Heero…well, everyone's just too scared of him'

'But still, we'll be hurting innocent people.'

'Innocent? _Innocent? _Fangirls are a scourge on the world for men! Think of the peace we will gain if we knock out the entire yaoi faction?'

Quatre smiled meekly, 'I'm not sure that I want peace. I've had plenty of it. Perhaps a bit overated. Fine, we'll help Duo, but no more violence than necessary okay guys? Guys?'

There were a number of clicks as Heero, Trowa and Wufei set their guns in place. Heero had pulled two silver pistols from….somewhere; Trowa was roping a long chain of ammunition for his battle rifle over his shoulder; and Wufei was clicking the belt of his flamethrower together.

Quatre sighed, 'I suppose we could all do with some violence huh?', and as he said so, he collected his tranquiliser gun and a number of refills from inside a secret compartment in the pillar by the door.

'Ready?' Heero asked. They nodded, and with that, the four armed gundam pilots leapt into the flurry of fangirls just as Duo's hand disappeared beneath the clouds of sand.

This fight would never replace the war and it was due to end in shorty, what with four violence-starved men appearing, armed and dangerous. In the near future peace will return to Earth. In the near future, Heero will check his cell phone for messages and find his voice mail blocked with pleas from Relena for him to come back and squash her like a bug, a sure sign of her forgiveness. In the near future, Quatre will go into Wufei's room and pick up the mess he made with a two metre long prong with his eyes blindfolded to protect his fragile little mind from the material he had provided his comrade with. In the near future, Wufei will be found sitting contentedly on top of a pile of smoking fangirl carcasses; he will certainly have something to tell his therapist next session. In the near future, Duo will be resuscitated in the medical clinic after a near death from lack of oxygen and severe trauma. Shortly afterwards he will be put out again by Trowa who will shoot him between the eyes with his battle rifle from point blank after finding Catherine amongst the cohorts of fangirls, somehow avoiding hitting Duo's brain. But Trowa did not feel that this was a faliure as, in his opinion, Duo had a slightly thicker skull and a brain perhaps a teensy, weensy bit smaller then everyone elses, so obviously, it was a harder target. So once Duo had been put back on life support, Trowa returned contentedly to save Catherine from Wufei's indiscriminate barbequing.

All in all, life was destined to go on, a bit duller then during the year AC 195, and peace would eventually wreak havoc on their minds again but, for the moment, they decided savour this piece of violence while they could.

* * *

**Mischief Mage:** That was it, the last chapter, hoped you liked it... well you must have because you managed to read all the way down here didn't you? Thanks for reading...reviews make me happy..._hint hint_

P.S Trowa's strategic plan was deliberately long and dull.


End file.
